Algae Scrubber Advanced

So I'm going to put a scrubber on my new 15x15x48" peninsula tank and looking for a few tips. Tank volume is 47 gallons and probably another 15 for filtration. It's going to be mainly LPS and some SPS, Zoas and a clam or two. I travel a lot and plan on setting up an auto live brine (or possibly copepod)feeder that is in turn fed by live micro algae(also for the clams, probably t isochrysis), and then some mysis and pellets to round out the nutrition. So I will have a lot more nutrient input than most standard reef tanks. I am building this on a peninsula "breakfast counter" that divides my kitchen from the living room and running all the filtration to the center of the cabinet bellow that measures 22x22x28.

Enough about the tank, I want to build an ATS based off a 10.5x13.5 screen, fed by my siphon overflow and lit on one side. I could make the screen smaller but was planning on 10.5 wide x 10 long and lit with LEDs. This would give me 105 in2 or about 4.25-4.5 cubes a day one sided, a lot for most small tanks but I would like to go overkill on size bc all of the brine shrimp and algae water would end up in the tank. This would make for great coral and clam growth but lots of nutrients. So I have no problem with screen space and water flow for 10.5" isn't a problem. Lighting is where Im currious where I should go. I have a few old mean well drivers for 48v, 700mw and 1050mw. I could use 16-18 red LEDs and 2 blue, on the 700 or two parallel strands on the 1050, what would you do and why as far as led strength and screen size? I was thinking about running something like a UFO LED from amazon for $70-100 but it seems to be better to just buy quality leds and a heatsink instead then build an enclosure for it. Anyone with amazon led experience?
 
Here's what I've found best. Go with 700mA and run 2 parallel arrays, so you get 350mA through each. Use Hyper-violets instead of royal blues, and wire those in parallel within the series string so that they only get 1/2 of the current of the reds. You need very little blue-violet, but it does help. Run at about 6-8 hours/day, depending on your initial results

Switch the configuration to series arrays when you get a good base of growth.

Better way: wire all in series (still violets in parallel within the series string) and put on a dimmable driver. Dim them down to 30-40% initially and run longer hours, like 12 or more. Adjust dimming up as screen matures until you find a place you like and that grows well, hours & intensity.

Paralleling arrays on 1050 is your call - if you lose one half of the array, you lose the other half right away, unless you have some fast-blow fuses in place. 525 mA might be too bright initially.
 
Thanks, how many LED's should I use of each? I recall it should be half of CF lighting, and that should be roughly 1W/square inch so is 1/2W of LED per square inch right, that just seems like a lot of light. I will probably run them in parallel on the 700mA blalast at 1/4W/in2 and if need be change it to series, haven't yet figured out how I'm going to hang the lights but probably hang them on some kind of T track with a roller so I can move them out of the way to get to the screen and fine tune intensity.
 
Has anyone found a good option for a factory made red led lamp? lots of options just not sure if a great option has surfaced in my months away from the forums.
Just not into the diy option atm.
 
I am waiting for 2 of the 20W versions of these lights to arrive.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/25124852971...49&var=550222621114&ssPageName=STRK:MEBIDX:IT

This will be my first scrubber so hopefully they will do the job. I like DIY but I dont like to mess with electrical. I couldnt find much on pre made lights apart from the ones from expressions ltd and another kind of LED multi-chip spotlight like the one I got but thinner however it had a bit of dead space below the reflector I didnt like so I went with these ones.

When they arrive I will build the acrylic box so it fits them nicely and post updates on how it all goes (probably on the beginer thread as thats where I belong for now :p)
 
Converting Skimmer into UAS

Converting Skimmer into UAS

I have a HOB skimmer, which is clear, so I want to try to use the upflow of the bubbles to my advantage to "internalize" a DIY ATS, or UAS, really.
I have a reef octopus style skimmer.
I have bought and roughed up the screen, and placed it vertically into the flow of bubbles, and have a brood style lamp shining on it.
My skimmer grows algae on the insides already because of the light, and I have to clean that off periodically, but I'm hoping it will take off on the screen.

Is there any reason this wouldn't work?
Any suggestions to improve it?
 
Skimmer bubbles are very fine and these don't cause vigorous and random flow across the algae mat. So it may or may not work. It might grow algae but the same screen in the same tank in an environment with larger bubbles would probably do better.
 
PIPSTER said:
I have a HOB skimmer, which is clear, so I want to try to use the upflow of the bubbles to my advantage to "internalize" a DIY ATS, or UAS, really.
I have a reef octopus style skimmer.
I have bought and roughed up the screen, and placed it vertically into the flow of bubbles, and have a brood style lamp shining on it.
My skimmer grows algae on the insides already because of the light, and I have to clean that off periodically, but I'm hoping it will take off on the screen.

Is there any reason this wouldn't work?
Any suggestions to improve it?
Click to expand...

It is growing algae (GOOD).
I still have some algae growing on my sand in the DT (BAD).

Do I just keep everything going as is, and wait it out, or do I need to cut the lights in the DT more for awhile?
I run blues only leds on lowest setting from 1pm to 8pm, while I run the HOB skimmer\scrubber lights 7am-9pm.
There is some morning sunlight that breaks through the window blinds for the first few hours, but is not direct light into the tank.
 
The light brown growth on sand is usually the first to leave. Especially if you have some sand-sifting fish. I'd just leave it.
 
These are all constant current drivers. Similar to a Meanwell LPC driver. It puts out a constant current, and the voltage output matches the associated drop for the string that it is connected to.

For instance, the 40W driver is meant to power LEDs that run at 1200mA. According to the listing, is also needs to power between 30 and 36V of drop. That means if you have a string of LEDs and each of them has a 3.2V drop when operating at 1200ma, you would need to use 10 LEDs. 10 x 3.2V = 32V total drop. At that voltage drop, you would have 32V x 1.2A = 38.4W of power provided by the driver.

If you had 9 LEDs, the total voltage drop would be 28.8V, which may or may not work. because, it's from China and you just don't know.

Now, a Meanwell driver, like the LPC-35-700 is designed to output 700mA with a maximum of 35W of output, which means 35W / 0.7A = 50V (minus 2V internal requirement so 48V) but it also can go down to 9v, so you can hook up a couple or you can max it out, and it's made with quality components so you can actually push it to the max without it smoking.

Personally I would just use 2 LPC-35-700s, much safer for relatively little additional cost...just saying, chinese junk is exactly that, I don't trust it. They use the absolute cheapest electronic components and minimal failsafes. Like, protection against overheating, thermal runaway, or improper user-made connections.
 
I love the 50/50 mix..
a>
 
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